


the day after

by cirrus (themorninglark)



Series: rareprompts [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Kitagawa Daiichi era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-07
Updated: 2015-07-07
Packaged: 2018-04-08 04:16:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4290486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/cirrus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kageyama Tobio - genius, prodigy, <i>first-year</i> - tips his head back ever so slightly, just millimetres, really, and meets his gaze. Unblinking.</p>
            </blockquote>





	the day after

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tothemoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tothemoon/gifts).



> For Justine, the Tobio-chan to my... uh, Kenma (this didn't make a lot of sense once it came out of my head). 
> 
> Repost from Tumblr so that I can keep all the rareprompts in one place!

“Iwaizumi-san.”

 _You_ , thinks Iwaizumi, without turning.

It’s a voice that shakes, ever so slightly; a voice that’s just starting to break and starting to find its timbre, a voice that  _shakes_ , not from fear, but from teetering on the threshold of teenage belligerence, and Iwaizumi remembers being two years younger himself.

“Kageyama.”

He draws himself up to his full height, and looks over his shoulder.

Kageyama Tobio is all limbs, like he’s still growing, awkwardly, into his own shape. He’s shorter than them, for now.  _It won’t last long._  Iwaizumi, if anything, is realistic. It’s a necessary evil that comes with the territory of being Oikawa Tooru’s best friend. He has to plant his feet to the ground, root himself enough for both of them so Oikawa doesn’t get lost in the clouds.

“Iwaizumi-san…”

Kageyama’s been running, and yet, he doesn’t sound breathless at all.

_What is this boy?_

“Oikawa-san - about him, he - ”

“Ah.” Iwaizumi runs a hand through his hair. It comes to rest on a throbbing vein by his temple.

“Don’t worry about him, Kageyama. Sorry about yesterday.”

Iwaizumi starts to turn back. They’re done. He’s done making apologies for Oikawa; some days, it feels like that’s all he does. But Kageyama Tobio - genius, prodigy,  _first-year_  - tips his head back ever so slightly, just millimetres, really, and meets his gaze. Unblinking.

His eyes are huge, and bright, and they shine with a fire that thirsts.

“It’s not just yesterday,” says Kageyama.

Iwaizumi drops his hand. Puts it in his pocket, and turns to face Kageyama fully, because he has nothing to say. All he has are actions, the action of giving Kageyama all his attention, the action of taking a step forward and looking straight into that steady glare, like a challenge.

“All along. Oikawa-san… he doesn’t like me, does he. He’s never liked me.”

Kageyama does not ask this. He states it, matter-of-fact.

Those blue-grey eyes simmer, like stormclouds over the ocean.

Iwaizumi huffs out a short sigh, because there’s no use denying it, and yet, he can’t really see any use in Kageyama knowing this fact either.

“Don’t take it personally. It’s not a problem with you. It’s a problem with Oikawa,” he says.

“I don’t understand. Why…?”

_There it is._

Iwaizumi shifts his weight from one foot to another, settles back onto his heels. There it is. The quiver in Kageyama’s lip, the way his voice wobbles, just a little.

Oikawa is everything that Kageyama wants to be on the court. And Oikawa, that asshole, doesn’t see it; doesn’t  _appreciate_  just how much his would-be usurper simply, wholeheartedly - admires him. Looks up to him.

No, he doesn’t see what Iwaizumi sees here, standing in front of him. He doesn’t see the fragility of Kageyama’s boldness, how much, truly, they are alike -

No, not totally alike.

Oikawa, lighter than air, belongs to the sky. He speaks half-lies and words that float away, that cover up the depths of his feelings. But there’s an  _intensity_  to Kageyama, something raw and ragged and open, so open in its  _truth_ , it feels like he could scorch the very grass around them.

“Oikawa is - ”

Iwaizumi starts, stops. Curls one hand into a fist in his pocket, because he doesn’t know just  _how_  to say what Oikawa is, and because he thinks that, right now, it’s too much for Kageyama.

Kageyama will grow. That unquenchable fire within him will soar into a mighty blaze of its own, long after he and Oikawa have left Kitagawa Daiichi, and it will light the way, but it will hurt, and it will leave wounds, and scars.

And it will take those scars, maybe, for Kageyama to finally stop burning the ground where he walks. And on that day, when the green grass starts to grow, they’ll meet again, maybe.

Iwaizumi shakes his head, and allows the tiniest of smiles to cross his lips for a moment.

“Don’t bother about Oikawa. Kageyama. Just - go on doing what you’re doing. You’re good.”

The smile fades. His brows settle back into their usual furrow as he turns and walks away, leaving a stunned-looking Kageyama in his wake.

As the breeze unfurls round him, the smell of pine fills the air.  _Evergreen._

Iwaizumi wonders how long it will take before that day comes.

He hopes it won’t be long.

 


End file.
